VICTORIA LAW FOUNDATION SEARCH WORKSHOP

Presentation by David Gatt Head of Search at Reactive

Feel free to reach out…

davidg @ reactive.com

Jonathans @ reactive.com

03 9415 2383

Twitter.com/reactive

Reactive.com

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A BRIEF HISTORY

Head of Search at Reactive

Search Engine Marketing Consultant

Search Analyst comparethemarket

.com

Digital Marketing

Analyst Lloydstsb.co.uk

Class Of 2006

SEO Manager Atom42.com

What is a search marketer? …well…Good Question!

SEO What I think I do…

What my mum thinks I do…

What my friends think I do…

What I actually do…

So what the heck is SEO and why should I care?

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THE IMPORTANCE OF SEO

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THE KEY INGREDIENTS FOR

HEALTHY SEO

The architecture is like the grains – you can’t have pasta without noodles and you can’t have a sandwich without bread- …they are considered staples for a reason (even if they are a bit out of fashion lately).

ARCHITECTURE (6-11 Servings) Proper Coding – Sean work manages the kiss metrics blog will walk you through the important aspects of

coding your site https://twitter.com/seanvwork

Optimize Page – Rick DeJarnette is a fantastic in-house SEO at MSN.com – he give some great, actionable

items in this post https://twitter.com/rickdejarnette

Meaningful Descriptions - Moz is probably our teams favourite SEO blog and my initial go-to resource

for all things SEO related.

Correct use of headers – Marc Purtell covers some of the best parts of a good H1 – but remember that

it goes beyond that too. H2, H3 – they still have some value as well https://twitter.com/MarcPurtell

XML Sitemaps - Mark Jackson covers it all in this post, from the standard XML sitemap – to video XML

Sitemap, Image XML Sitemap, and more https://twitter.com/MarkJackson

Eliminate Crawl errors - This post by Joe Robison is a little older now – but the content is so great its still

worth reading http://moz.com/blog/how-to-fix-crawl-errors-in-google-webmaster-tools

ARCHITECTURE (6-11 Servings) No duplicate content - If you don’t know who Matt Cutts is – you need to – and read this about how to

handle duplicate content on your site. https://twitter.com/mattcutts

Speed (Website Load Time) Neil Patel and Sujan Patel deliver great information in an easy to follow

format – digest this goodness. https://twitter.com/neilpatel https://twitter.com/sujanpatel

Optimised URLs - Mark Nunney outlines the most important things you need to know about URLs and how

they effect SEO https://twitter.com/marknunney

Mobile Ready - the team at Mobify has a really great ebook for download on mobile SEO

http://www.mobify.com/go/mobile-seo-guide/

Internal Linking - Graham Charlton gives you some great ideas for internal linking and how it applies to

SEO https://twitter.com/gcharlton

The best way to get natural, relevant links is to create authoritative and helpful content that people actually want to share and link to…

Content Creation (3-5 Servings) Blog – Rich Brooks wrote a really nice article about blogging from an SEO perspective

https://twitter.com/therichbrooks

Infographics - Sam Miranda gives a great argument for using infographics as part of your content creation for

SEO https://twitter.com/samjazzed/

Evergreen – Kevan Lee is a content genius – you want to read this post from top to bottom and learn how to

be effective at evergreen content https://twitter.com/kevanlee

Skyscraper - Garrett Moon nails down exactly how to do the Skyscraper method of content creation – a

must read https://twitter.com/garrett_moon

White Papers – Mike Stelzner founder of SocialMediaExaminer.com, shows you the ins and outs of the

perfect white paper https://twitter.com/Mike_Stelzner

Videos - check out the Wistia learning center to learn about video productions, video strategy and video

marketing http://wistia.com/learning

Promotion is the fruit – its sweet, and almost treat-like, as it brings in the links and social shares from the quality content you just created…

Promotion (2 - 4 Servings)

Create Snippets - The Buffer team put together a really short, but great, resource for creating snippets so

others can share you content easily https://plus.google.com/+Bufferapp/posts/CEgaLyHz3Tk

Reach out to Influencers - Kevin Cain shows you how to take your content to the masses by engaging

the help of big time influencers https://twitter.com/kevinrcain

Similar Content - use ahrefs.com to find people that have shared similar content and see if they would link

to yours https://ahrefs.com/

Content Communities - Blog Engage and Bizsugar are so great sites to check out to get your content on

other sites with bigger communities http://bizsugar.com/ http://www.blogengage.com/

Discovery Sites - Stumbleupon and Reddit are two great sites to help others discover your content

http://www.stumbleupon.com/ http://www.reddit.com/

Content Distribution - Jordan Teicher with Contently gives you the inside scoop on the pros and cons of

the top 10 content distributers https://twitter.com/JordanTeicher

Google is placing a higher emphasis now on how pleasant your website is for a human being to visit. You can consider UX to be the comfort food… …it’s your baked macaroni n’cheese and a refreshing glass of milk.

User Experience (2 - 3 Servings)

Design – Alex Harris is an expert for a reason – he helps you get a better understanding here – and its much

deeper than the colour of your CTA button https://twitter.com/alexdesigns

Navigation – Great resource from Anastasios Karafillis to help you make navigation as simple as possible

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/author/anastasios-karafillis/?rel=author

Usability Testing – I’ve used UserTesting.com to have actual human beings test out my website and see if

there is anything confusing to them http://www.usertesting.com/

Interviews – this one is obvious – just ask people some questions and see what they say. You might be

surprised at their answers about your website http://uxmastery.com/better-user-research-through-surveys/

Customer Journey Mapping – grab the sticky notes and map out each possible scenario your customer

can have – then make it better http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2014/01/27/pragmatic-ux-techniques-for-smarter-websites/

Mobile UX – RedAnt has 10 awesome tips for making sure your mobile experience is as top notch as the rest

of your site https://www.redant.com/articles/ten-tips-for-mobile-ux/

“To better optimise your site you need to first understand your customer journey…”

Social Signals are the Sunday afternoon barbecue – you light up the grill, invite your friends and share some burgers, brats, wings, or ribs – the good stuff…

Social Signals (2 - 3 Servings) Facebook – John Rampton lays out a solid game plan for crushing it on Facebook

https://twitter.com/johnrampton

Twitter – You absolutely MUST know who Gary Vaynerchuk is if you want to be good at Social Media – and

read his book, Jab Jab Jab Right Hook https://twitter.com/garyvee

Google+ – David Nield teaches you the absolute must-haves of Google Plus – and how to do them

https://twitter.com/davidnield

LinkedIn – Rachel Gillett will show you how to “become a content master” on LinkedIn

https://twitter.com/RGillett23

Pinterest – Check out these 15 amazing tips on getting traction out of Pinterest from Lilian Sue

https://twitter.com/LSue23

Instagram – Another outstanding guide from David Nield at kicking butt on Instagram

http://fieldguide.gizmodo.com/10-tricks-to-make-yourself-an-instagram-master-1601722027

In the #9 most-watched YouTube ad of the year, Budweiser explains: "Next time you go out, be sure to make a plan to get home safely. Your friends are counting on you. Enjoy Budweiser responsibly. #FriendsAreWaiting." This video tugs at the heartstrings and had only 948 thumbs down on YouTube with 48k thumbs up.

This is the sweets and treats, the fast food, the stuff that makes you feel great for about a minute but leaves you with a belly ache…

Link Building (Use Sparingly) Dead Link Replacement – The Authoritative guide from Neil Patel and Brian Dean – everything you need

to know to master this https://twitter.com/Backlinko

Sponsored Links – Anytime you are buying links beware – read this article by Google so you can make sure

you don’t get in trouble https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66356?hl=en

Directory Submissions – Great post by Kurtis Bohrnstedt and what you need to watch for when

submitted to directories https://twitter.com/Kourteous

Badges - A great Q & A on the Moz Forum discussing using badges in modern day SEO

http://moz.com/community/q/a-2014-perspective-on-using-awards-badges-for-backlinks

Thinking outside of the box

The Challenge: To create a natural linkbuilding strategy to help increase Plan Australia’s authority within Google.

The Result: Corporate social responsibility badges, used as corporate marketing collateral to inform stakeholders on the good work

they are doing as part of their commitment to corporate social responsibility. Also from a search perspective, providing a direct link

from (example Coca Cola) to Plan Australia’s website.

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QUICK WINS

Custom 404 Pages

Create useful 404 pages for Non-existent page

What is a 404 Error Page? • Non-existent page

Why create a custom 404 page? • Improve the user experience • Keep visitors on your site • Help them find the information

they're looking for

Create useful 404 pages for Non-existent page

Make sure your 404 page uses the same look and feel (including navigation) as the rest of your site. (YES) Tell visitors clearly that the page they're looking for can't be found. Consider adding links to your most popular articles or posts, as well as a link to your site's home page Use language that is friendly and inviting.

Create useful 404 pages for Non-existent page

Make sure your 404 page uses the same look and feel (including navigation) as the rest of your site. (YES) Tell visitors clearly that the page they're looking for can't be found. (YES) Consider adding links to your most popular articles or posts, as well as a link to your site's home page (YES) Use language that is friendly and inviting.

Create useful 404 pages for Non-existent page

Make sure your 404 page uses the same look and feel (including navigation) as the rest of your site. (YES) Tell visitors clearly that the page they're looking for can't be found. (YES) Consider adding links to your most popular articles or posts, as well as a link to your site's home page (YES) Use language that is friendly and inviting (YES)

H1 Tags

Descriptive H1 Tags (Duplicates tag)

Is this a serious problem? YES and NO GDuplicate <h1> won’t penalise site ranking. Case Study – The Big Issue Are they set on each page? YES However Google uses H1 and other content fields to make sense of a page. The better Google knows what your page is trying to do, the greater the probability it’ll start showing it in as a search result.

Page Titles

Page Titles (Duplicate)

FREE SEO Resources http://www.wordstream.com/free-keyword-tools http://www.keywordeye.com/ https://www.youtube.com/keyword_tool http://ubersuggest.org/ https://www.removeem.com/ratios.php http://word2cleanhtml.com/ http://www.copyscape.com/ http://moz.com/blog/100-free-seo-tools

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THANKYOU